Search - The Day of the Cobra on DVD

Many man-to-man fights, running, climbing, jumping, simplist

Pork Chop | Lisbon, Portugal | 03/30/2007

(2 out of 5 stars)

"In "DAY OF THE COBRA" (1980) Enzo G. Castellari demonstrates a
spectrum of talened movie making skills, that will appeal to the
audience from several points of view. Still, there are a number
of weak points in the overall picture, that downscore the movie
despite being small things, but that still have a significant
impact on the perception of quality.

The first, is the soundtrack's vocals, whose singer would have
greated benefited from several years of karoke practice and an
infinite number of singing lessons.

The second downside is the somewhat neanderthal dialog over
several scenes, which may leave uncomfortable the more
sophisticated, or even, the mainstream audience, and the
entirety of those disliking action movies. For the layman,
probably the soundtrack, and simplistic lines won't be an
issues.

On the other hand, the special effects (fireball explosions,
pistol battles, man-to-man fights, running, climbing, jumping
etc.) will no doubt appeal to those appreciating the more
physical aspects of this particular art work.

Starring Franco Nero and Sybil Danning, the former does an
fine, professional effort as a dead-serious, no-nonense
detective arriving from the USA to bust wide open a cocaine
trafficking ring operating between France and Italy. There's a
number of interesting filmed shots of Genova, mainly around the
shipping and maritime port operations and a few city shots too.

Inexplicably, there's a few humorous spots, from which some will
surely chuckle, such as the typical 70's era dance halls, and
the moment when the club owner takes her wig off, and shows off
a muscled body, revealing herself actually to be "Ivan",
anything but a woman.

Overall, despite the massive acting effort of Nero, and charisma
of the supporting cast, the picture has a distinctive "B-Movie"
feel to it, which is even more justified, as said, from the
monotone, narrow vocal range of a construction-worker singing
the central movie jingle "I am the Cobra..."

As a 1975 movie, it wouldn't have been bad, but released in
1980, surely it was massively dated in the minds of the public.
Yet, in terms of the action sequences, these still appear very
much fresh and real."